Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 5.djvu/216

276 having left any children, called him over to that country to look after the settlement of his affairs, on which occasion, all his transatlantic predilections being revived, he resolved to withdraw from the dangers and the vicissitudes of a seafaring life, to settle in the colony, and to devote the remainder of his days to the peaceful pursuits of rural industry and philosophic retirement.

There is nothing more curious in the history of the human mind than that satiety and languor which so frequently come over the most active spirits. Gowley often had thoughts of burying himself in the woods of America, where he fancied he would be happy, in seclusion from all intercourse with the busy and bustling portions of society: Cromwell, with all his unconquerable daring and unquenchable activity and Hambden, one of the brightest, the boldest, and the most disinterested spirits that have adorned any age or country, despairing of the state of political affairs in their native land, sought to escape their uneasy sensations, and to secure religious peace and happiness, by the same expedient. Akin, perhaps, to these cases was that of Paul Jones, whose mind seems from the first to have been replete with lofty aspirations, fitting him for greatness, while his connexions in his own country were of a nature to prevent his ever gratifying them. We can easily conceive this bold and enthusiastic man sensible of the superiority of his powers above those of most other men, but fretting at the cold obstructions which were put before him, by the rules and habits of society in his own country, and also perhaps at the notoriety of his ignoble origin; and therefore preferring to lose himself in an American forest, where, if he did not gain any distinction, he would not at least be esteemed as lower than his personal merit warranted. Had the colonies been in a state of tranquillity, Jones would probably have spent the remainder of his days as a simple colonist, or perhaps gone back to sea, to escape the monotony of a life but little suited to his faculties. The country, however, was now in a state of high effervescence, which was every day increasing, and which called forth the energies, such as they were, of every individual among them, either on the one side or the other. Great dissatisfaction had for a long period been prevalent respecting the measures of the British government in reference to the colonies, and in the speculations of the colonists with regard to the steps necessary to be taken for counteracting these measures, Jones found the tedium of his retirement wonderfully relieved. Open resistance was no sooner proposed, than he found that he had mistaken the natural bent of his genius, which was much more turned towards action than solitary speculation ; and when Congress, in the close of the year 1775, began to equip a naval force to assist in asserting American independence, he stepped boldly forward to offer his service. He was at once appointed to be first lieutenant aboard the Alfred, one of the only two ships belonging to the Congress; and in that capacity hoisted with his own hands for the first time the flag of independent America. In the course of a few months, by his activity and success, he gained the entire confidence of the marine committee, and from the hands of the president received a captain's commission. In the end of the year 1777, he was sent to France, in command of the Ranger, a new sloop of war, with despatches containing an account of the victory obtained by the colonists at Saratoga. As a reward for the important services he had already rendered to the Americans, it was ordered that he should be promoted to the command of the Indian, a fine frigate built for the Congress at Amsterdam, the Banger, at the same time, acting under his orders; but the American commissioners at Paris, from motives of policy, assigned the Indian over to the king of France. Captain Jones, of course, remained in command of the Ranger, with which he convoyed a fleet of merchant-men to Quiberon Bay, and there, from the French commandant, received the first salute that had ever been given